I woke up to a siren in my living room last night. It was about 3:00 in the morning, and I stumbled from my bed and down the hall. You know how when you wake up to a loud noise you don’t really know what’s going on, but you know you need to do something?

I tripped and fell at the end of the hallway and wound up sprawled in front of the television set. Static pulsed from the screen and the siren grew louder. It wasn’t like any siren I’d ever heard.

From the glow cast by the TV, I could just barely make out five large, perfectly-formed mounds of dirt arranged around my coffee table. On one was a burning candle, stuck by a lump of soft wax to a severed finger.

Help, I think my house is directed by David Lynch.

I know you think a house fire would be bad, but it’s really changed my life. I don’t doubt myself anymore. I don’t wake up to sirens or strange noises. No starting out of a nightmare only to come face-to-face with a formaldehyde-soaked cat corpse. That cat was the only friend I had. The cat’s dead now, Mr. Lynch. I hope you’re happy.

That night, sitting in front of my television, I found a match on the floor. Odd, as I don’t use many matches. Tentatively at first, I extended the match head into the flame of the candle and it burst to life. I held it in my hand for a long time, watching it burn. When it had almost reached my fingertips, I dropped it on the carpet.

It’s strange how such a small match can do so much. The carpet caught fire instantly, and the flames spread much faster than I expected.

Oops, it worked. My house would soon be gone. I would soon be homeless. What about my important tax documents in the top drawer of my desk? What about the hat rack that my aunt Sadie insisted was a priceless antique? What about Chad, the grad student who rents my basement room?

All that would soon be gone. Soon I would find myself standing on the sidewalk in my pajamas, being examined by a callopigian paramedic—Aphrodite with an ambulance, so caring, so tender, as I watched the flames rising high above my head.

You wouldn’t think a house that size would burn so fast, would you, Mr. Lynch? You wouldn’t think that the smoke would spread so far, that the sirens would wake the neighbors from their own restless dreams.